LOVERS by Shan

Via G is a New Orleans creator (yes, the baby bangs) who spent her twenties moving from one 18-month relationship to the next, and the last one looked perfect on paper: he cooked, he could match her financially, and he carried the fatherly energy of a man who already knew how everything should be done. Her body figured it out before she did. Her cycle unraveled over the year they were together, and not long after she ended it (20 minutes and six seconds, start to finish) her hormone test came back with perfect scores.

Via walks Shan through the slow disappearing act in between (the gray sweatpants, the running commentary on how she cut onions, a moment of coercion she didn't have language for until a friend named it), and then the year of saying yes to herself that followed: cutting her own bangs on camera, walking into pool parties alone to make girlfriends, and buying the Bronco she'd been talked out of. Shan offers a frame for why "daddy knows best" can feel like love when you grew up without one.

This one is for anyone who has shrunk to fit someone and is ready to be loud again.

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Showing some love to the sponsor of this episode Hollyood Ending. It is the book everyone will be talking about this fall. Buy Hollywood, Ending now wherever books are sold.

Big shoutout to the sponsor of this episode Beducated. Unlock deeper pleasure with a roadmap designed for you — all it takes is 5 minutes. Go to https://beduc.at/bg2640-boody to learn more!

Ready to reach your goals? Visit forhers.com/shan to get personalized, affordable care that gets you.

Follow Via G

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mylifeasvia/

TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@_mylifeasvia_

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@MyLifeAsVia

X: https://x.com/mylifeasvia

All links: https://link.me/mylifeasvia

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I'm answering your comments on Kendrick Sampson choosing freedom over romance, and you did not agree.

When Kendrick Sampson (the actor you know from Insecure and How to Get Away with Murder, and the activist behind BLD PWR) sat down with me and said he cares about freedom more than romance, I had a feeling some of you would feel seen and some of you would feel personally called out, and the comments landed right down the middle. [One side heard someone finally say out loud that romantic love is only one kind of love worth building a life around, while the other side heard something that felt like permission to never fully choose anyone. CONFIRM against actual comments.] In this first episode of If It Don't Apply, Let It Fly, I'm reading the comments that split you and responding to them honestly, [including the ones that shifted how I think about the conversation and the ones I'm holding my ground on. CONFIRM against what Shan actually says]. If you walked away from Kendrick's episode feeling defensive, inspired, or stuck somewhere uncomfortable in between, this is for you, because the disagreement is where the real conversation was happening.

Follow Kendrick Sampson
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kendrick38
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@kendrick
BLD PWR: https://bldpwr.com

Want more LOVERS?
Follow Shan on Instagram → http://instagram.com/shanboodram
Get a free weekly Love Letter from Shan → http://loversbyshan.com/newsletter
Join the Lovers Community → https://www.loversbyshan.com/community
Explore free quizzes + worksheets → http://loversbyshan.com/quizzes

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Kendrick Sampson (founder of the racial justice nonprofit BLD PWR, actor best known as Nathan in Insecure and Quincy Jones in Michael Jackson's biopic) sits down with Shan to talk about loving widely.

Kendrick grew up in a house where nobody said "I love you" after his parents divorced, so love turned into something you did instead of something you said. Love is choosing someone else's needs over your own wants. It's why he has no plan for a romantic relationship, why he separates sex, pleasure, and love into three completely different things, and why he'll tell you flat out that romantic love is actually the smallest, most narrow kind there is.

His 25 nieces and nephews come first. If he ever has kids, he wants to raise them with a homegirl, no romance required, because the village already exists. This is a conversation about what happens when you stop assuming a partner is the endpoint, and start asking who you're actually accountable to.

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Showing some love to the sponsor of this episode Hollyood Ending. It is the book everyone will be talking about this fall. Buy Hollywood, Ending now wherever books are sold.

Ready to reach your goals? Visit forhers.com/shan to get personalized, affordable care that gets you.

Follow Kendrick Sampson

Instagram: http://instagram.com/kendrick38

Follow BLD PWR

Instagram: http://instagram.com/bldpwrYouTube: youtube.com/@buildpowertv

Want more LOVERS?

Follow Shan on

Instagram → http://instagram.com/shanboodram

Get a Lovers Letters from Shan → http://loversbyshan.com/newsletter

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Explore free quizzes + worksheets → http://loversbyshan.com/quizzes
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Every couple of years, after a stretch that tested us, Jared and I climb onto the roof in the same outfit and talk honestly about what it did to our relationship. We did it in 2022 and again in 2024, and the second time a lot of people watched two exhausted parents be imperfect and decided that was the verdict on the whole thing. We're doing it anyway, because the hard years reach your love life whether you film it or not.

This summer the kids were home for six weeks, the business didn't pause, several of my longest relationships shifted at once, and somewhere in there we had our worst argument in six years. It looked like it was about one day. It was actually about neither of us having the room to feel anything, and what happens when one person finally does. Jared explains why he didn't come over and hold me (an honest answer, not a flattering one), I explain why a voucher I printed him for exactly this moment stayed in his closet, and we get into how sex has changed as the kids have gotten older, including the 25-minute challenge he almost survived.

This is a conversation about staying kind to the person closest to you when you have nothing left. If you've ever been graded on your worst week, this one is for you.

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Thanks to Article for sponsoring this podcast! Article is offering our listeners $50 off your first purchase of $100 or more. To claim, visit ARTICLE.COM/LOVERS and the discount will be automatically applied at checkout.

My pickiest eaters have no complaints on this one! Explore my Hungryroot Digital Cookbook "Recipes My Kids Will Actually Finish (No Bribery Required)." at https://hungryroot.com/LOVERS

Ready to reach your goals? Visit forhers.com/shan to get personalized, affordable care that gets you.

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Follow Jared Brady

Instagram: http://instagram.com/enjoyjaredbrady

YouTube: youtube.com/@enjoyovereverything

Want more LOVERS?

Follow Shan

Instagram → http://instagram.com/shanboodram

Get a free weekly Love Letter from Shan → http://loversbyshan.com/newsletter

Join the Lovers Community → https://www.loversbyshan.com/community

Explore free quizzes + worksheets → http://loversbyshan.com/quizzes
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Brandi and Lawrence aren't a couple. He's a gay man, she's a lesbian, and they were best friends first, until they decided, in their twenties, to build a family together on purpose, with a legal parental agreement in place before they ever tried to conceive.

They walk Shan through what that intentionality actually looked like. But underneath the logistics is the part nobody warned either of them about, the isolation Lawrence carried as the only man in his friend group building a family this way, and the year their living situation and their respective romantic relationships pulled the friendship apart so hard that Brandi had to tell Lawrence something she still calls one of the biggest heartbreaks of her life: that she could stay his co-parent, but she couldn't stay his friend.

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Ready to reach your goals? Visit https://www.forhers.com/shan to get personalized, affordable care that gets you.

Right now, our listeners get an additional 15% off any MasterClass annual membership at https://www.masterclass.com/lovers

Follow Parental Agreement

Resource → https://u42luyhpb6f.typeform.com/agreement

Website → http://theparentalagreement.com/

Follow Lawrence

Instagram → https://www.instagram.com/lawrenceccarroll/

Majestic Art Gallery → https://majesticartgallery.org/

Donate to LA Pride → https://lapride.org/donate-to-la-pride/

Follow Brandi

Instagram → https://www.instagram.com/brandijandrews/?hl=en

Youth Dealer, skincare for melanated people → https://www.instagram.com/youthdealerco/?hl=en

Want more Lover?

Receive my Lovers Letter → http://loversbyshan.com/newsletter

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Explore quizzes and worksheets → http://loversbyshan.com/quizzes
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